


Something Found in the Dark

by BebopHeadshop



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Amnesia, Bittersweet Ending, Character Death, Glimpses into Ferdinand and Hubert's life together following the war, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Melancholy, POV Original Character, Post-Black Eagles Route (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-24
Updated: 2020-01-24
Packaged: 2021-02-24 18:54:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22382791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BebopHeadshop/pseuds/BebopHeadshop
Summary: Following the death of his husband, Hubert is visited by an old companion bearing a message from the late Ferdinand.cw: References to canon-typical torture, child abuse
Relationships: Ferdinand von Aegir/Hubert von Vestra
Comments: 2
Kudos: 50





	Something Found in the Dark

Her most whole, unbroken memories only extend as far back as the moment when she was freed. Her consciousness had been forced awake and startled out of a strangled slumber when the door to her cell collapsed, slamming to the ground and pushing up a storm of dust and dirt in the stagnant cell. She remembers choking back coughs as the fear of whatever lay behind that broken door consumed her mind.

There’s someone in here, she heard a voice from beyond the dust. Strong and booming. Like an explosion. She recoiled, but the harsh scrape of metal on stone reminded her where she was. Where she had been forever.

Are they alive? a new voice asked, a whisper compared to the first. 

And then the sun emerged from the darkness, flooding her sight. Billowing copper waves filled her vision, a beacon of light that truly blinded her. The man knelt before her.

Are you alright? the man asked as he placed his lance on the ground and unsheathed the sword at his hip. She drew back, but her body only met the hard, stone wall behind her.

No, no; you are okay now, the man said as he cut the chains that bound her wrists to the walls above her. She quickly brought them to her body, cradling herself.

A second man appeared from the smoke. 

So they’ve actually left one alive, he snarled. Now a face to match the whisper.

If you call this being alive, the first man said. He picked his lance up and threw it to his companion behind him, who caught it with ease. I’ll need to carry this one back.

He turned towards her. Slowly the man lifted his hand, offering it to her. 

“Fear not, for you are not alone. I am here with you, and you will no longer be surrendered to this dark suffering.”

The second man smiled, only a slight change in expression, but one she noticed nonetheless. He peered at her through the haze of dust, a pale visage amongst the darkness. He nodded at her.

She nodded back. She took his hand.

**50 Years Later**

The cool breeze pushed her grey curls into her face as she straddled the back of her horse, the line of trees bordering the riding trail giving way to the clearing where her house stood. The Verdant Rain Moon had only just begun, but it had already brought with it a chill tinge to the air of the territory surrounding the former fortress of Arianrhod. She had passed by the dilapidated fortress on her ride, as she always did. The fortress’s destruction had occurred before her memories began. She’d asked Ferdinand and Hubert about it many years ago, when she first purchased this territory that so closely bordered the abandoned fortress. Her few neighbors living in the vicinity spoke of it in hushed whispers, claiming the place to be haunted by the apparitions of those who’d fallen in the war of unification all those years ago. Even Hubert was solemn, recounting the destruction of that place. They didn’t usually leave people alive, was all he had told her then. Ferdinand had furrowed his brow at that, then spoke reassuring words to her.

As she neared the entrance of the clearing, she dismounted slowly from Pan, carefully lowering herself back to the ground. She was no longer a spry woman, as to be expected of someone of 63 years, give or take. Her true age still eluded her. With only sparse memories offering broken glimpses of a childhood spent playing in fields of rhododendrons, she had little to go on. Occasionally during her long horseback rides, the whisper of a memory would call out to her through the silence. But no matter how often she chased them, pressuring Pan into a gallop as she pursued the ever distant cries, even then she was only left with misshapen pieces that never quite fit anything resembling a full picture. It was better than nothing, yet it still often spurred on a dull sense of loss. Even Hubert’s investigation had come up short; far too many people had gone missing during the war to find a lead on a single girl who couldn’t even remember her own name. 

But based on the dull ache in her joints brought about after such a short ride, she figured that 63 was an adequate enough guess.

She grabbed Pan’s reins and ambled down the remainder of the trail with him. He was slower today too, hesitating with each step and offering some resistance. Maybe his age was getting to him as well, she considered. He had been a gift from Ferdinand almost 20 years ago. Ferdinand had often visited her at this modest estate, leading her on long rides around the nearby territories before his advanced age barred him from his favorite pastime. He often recounted anecdotes from the war, stories of hard-fought victories shared with friends and allies. He voiced only tales of gallantry and valor during their evening rides, the setting sun framing the charred remains of the deserted fortress in a brilliant halo.

A sharp ache fought its way up her back as she continued to stroll down the trail. Her healer’s words came back to her then, the repeated warnings of how dangerous it was for a woman of her age to venture out into the wilderness alone; how a single fall or riding accident could spell a broken bone and a lonesome death in the woods. But she figured that without the quiet of the woods, without the silent time to think and piece together the fragments of her past, even as they continually cracked and shifted... that without this time alone, she would have shattered completely long before her fiftieth year of freedom. Pan shifted restlessly beside her as they finally broke into the clearing. She shifted the reins in her hands and ran her fingers through his mane. Maybe that wasn’t quite true, she decided; she hadn’t been alone during this. 

As she neared her home, she noticed a conspicuous man sitting at her doorstep. Advancing towards him, she noted his furrowed brow and even more so the hefty parcel he cradled in his arms. He raised his head when he noticed her and Pan approaching.

The man jutted up from his seated position, brown bangs escaping from his cap and falling into his eyes. “Are you Lady Henri?” he asked cautiously.

“That is what I am called,” she replied, not stopping by her doorway, but instead leading Pan to the gated field adjacent to her home.

“Ah, my lady, one moment if you would..!” he replied, surging forward to follow after her.

“No need for haste sir; I’m just leading Pan back to the stables.”

“Ah, yes. Of course, of course,” he said, shifting back and forth on his feet. Beads of sweat formed on his flushed face as Henri unlocked the gate to the field and led Pan to the stables. By the time she returned back to the man moments later, he was drenched in sweat, clutching the parcel between his fingers far too tightly.

“T-this is…” he began, attempting to make eye contact with her, but failing.

“A package from the former Prime Minister?” she asked slowly and levelly, though she already knew the answer.

“Y-yes,” he shrilly responded, seemingly relieved that he didn’t have to say the words himself. Hastily, he handed the package to her.

“You have my gratitude for delivering this all the way out here.”

“It’s my duty to serve,” he responded, turning to walk away back down the trail. “I-I have to return to the capital now. I left my horse in the stables at a nearby inn, but then lost my way here, so I’m sure he’s wondering where I am by now...”

“Hm.” Henri replied, eyes staring at the parcel in her hands.

The man began to fumble his way back through the clearing and to the trail that Henri had just emerged from. But suddenly, he turned around. “I’m… I’m sorry…” he said, barely a whisper to Henri’s ears. She never looked back up from the parcel, but listened wordlessly as his footsteps drifted further and further away. 

A few minutes after the sound of his steps had been completely replaced by the whistling of the cool breeze, she returned to the gate by her home. Unlocking it and stepping into the field, she slowly made her way back to the stables. Pan was there waiting for her, brown eyes following her intently. She slowly seated herself on a pile of hay by the stable doors. Her old joints cracked and protested, that increasingly familiar soreness now accompanied by a dull ache in her chest that forced her to catch her breath. Delicately, she removed the journal from the parcel.

**...**

From her place by the door, Henri could see that the gaudy, golden amulet with a conspicuous star-shaped jewel still lay on his desk, in the same place it had been since he and Ferdinand had first moved to this estate years ago. She had once asked Hubert about it in her youth, but he simply seemed irritated and said it was more trouble than it was worth, ending the conversation with a strange smile on his face. She later asked Ferdinand to clarify, but decided that she was no longer interested in the details once he began rambling about his bachelor party.

She had been standing by the ornate door for a few minutes now, silently observing Hubert, who was seated at his desk across from her as he finished the paperwork that lay before him. He was supposed to have retired over a decade and a half ago, but the letters from Ferdinand that had arrived at her doorstep every few weeks often told a different story. Ferdinand usually began them with complaints about how their joint retirements reverted their shared estate in Enbarr into more of an office, rather than the relaxing villa that it was intended to be, with the number of files that Hubert had transferred from his former study in the palace. He thought that once Emperor Edelgard passed away that Hubert would find the time to devote himself to other tasks, _like his family_ , she remembers Ferdinand once writing to her in brilliant red ink. But instead, even once the pair had retired following their emperor’s passing, Hubert still seemed to devote himself to maintaining the legacy that she had passed on to her successor.

But Henri didn’t mind the wait; she never had, really. She had spent many hours with him at his former study in the palace, silently listening to the crinkle of paper and the scratch of his pen as he completed his work. She would sit nearby working on her own studies or drifting off into that blank void of the past, only returning back to the present when he called her name, leading her off to their suite to share dinner with Ferdinand. But now, as she stood in this room, she could only think of the weight of the journal in her hands.

“You missed the funeral, Henrietta,” Hubert suddenly said, placing his pen down on the table and looking up at her.

It was the first time she’d spoken to him in years, not since her last stay at this estate five years ago. At that time she had been dragged back to this place from her home by Phillip, who wanted to have something of a reunion. It was honestly a bit stifling, finding this typically tranquil place bursting to the brim with all of Phillip’s children and friends, along with the families of all of Hubert and Ferdinand’s old friends and allies from the war. She had been much too old to form meaningful friendships with the children of the couple’s friends, unlike Phillip, who moved his way between the Bergliez’s, Gloucester’s, and Gautier’s as if he were a member of their own houses. Phillip and Ferdinand had charmed their way through the crowds, the younger man the spitting image of his father at that age, Henri reminisced. She had eventually wandered away from the noise and raucous, drifting down the hallway until she had found her way to this study. She slipped in, knowing that no one else would have the gall to enter this place uninvited. As she had closed the door, a whisper of a voice called out from the depths of the room behind her. “I had a feeling you’d be joining me here today.” She turned around and saw Hubert sitting at his desk, one corner of his lips curled up. “Relax while you can,” he said, turning his attention back to the papers in front of him, “Caspar’s egregious tales will only hold their attention for so long before Ferdinand and Phillip come to hunt us down.” She moved from the door and took a seat in the chair opposite his desk, slipping back into that familiar routine from all those years ago.

“I apologize for not being present at the funeral, Hubert,” she replied, clutching the journal in her hands. “I was warned not to come.” She shifted on her feet, the letter that she had found tucked into the journal now resting in her pocket.

“Why would someone threaten you?” He asked, thin eyebrows drifting dangerously low.

“No, not a threat. Rather a...” she searched for the word, “safeguard.”

“Hm.” Hubert replied, leaning back in his chair. She thought it looked a lot larger than it had five years ago. “Someone wished to avoid your discomfort from that reunion then, I presume..?”

Ferdinand had found them eventually, in the study. He had sent Philip to search the opposite wing of the estate, knowing that his son’s inherited diligence would buy the three some time together. They slipped into that familiar rapport that had been built up all those years ago. It was like falling back into a dream, Henri had thought at the time, listening to Ferdinand ramble on in spite of Hubert’s sardonic jabs, the silent hum of love lacing their words still discernible to anyone who listened. But then, Henri considered that maybe it wasn’t quite a dream; she conceded that it was completely unlike those fragmented whispers in the woods that slipped past her fingers before she could fully grasp them. Instead it was something more tangible, something that could be preserved. But all the same it ended far too quickly, with Phillip eventually catching on to the ruse and admonishing the trio before dragging them back into the crowd.

“I suppose I understand, though your company would have been appreciated,” Hubert said, adding the final page that he had been working on to the stack at the edge of his desk, “there was quite a crowd. I can’t imagine how it was possible for one man to make _that_ many friends.”

“He was always quite capable of finding friends in many surprising places,” she replied, “not unlike yourself.” He studied her for a moment before giving a soft affirmation.

Then he continued. “But if your late arrival was truly to avoid any raucous, then you’re in luck; Philip and his brood just departed for Derdriu a little over a week ago.”

“Then I should apologize again for leaving you alone to bear that burden by yourself.”

His face softened slightly, as much as his gaunt features would allow. “It was… more pleasant than you might guess,” he responded. And on second thought, she pondered, imagining all of those freckled faces peering out through copper-coated bangs, maybe it was.

“There is something I’ve always wanted to ask you, Hubert.” She asked levelly, not breaking eye contact between her and the man before her.

“Then you may as well ask it now,” he replied, the slight rise of his eyebrow preventing him from fully feigning disinterest. He had gotten worse at hiding that over the years, she noted; it reminded her of someone else.

The rehearsed words sounded clearer than she thought they would, “Why did you choose me, Hubert?” 

In actuality, it was a question that she’d never ask him of her own volition, placated enough as she was throughout the years just by the fact that he _had_ kept her by his side, not resigning her to the fate of a potential spy for those who had imprisoned her in the first place. But the letter resting at her hip told her that she should ask.

Hubert’s lips curled up into a soft smile. He averted his gaze from her slightly, eyes drifting off to the shadows behind her. She knew that look well. A year after her rescue she had once stayed with Lysithea, an old friend of the pair, while Hubert and Ferdinand were away from the palace on business that could not involve a girl of dubious origins. When Hubert introduced the two, only a brief moment of pity flashed on the white-haired woman’s face before she took Henri’s hands, inviting her into her home. She had learned during the months spent with the woman that their stories were a bit different; Lysithea remembered a time before the experiments and chains, remembered the moments during it. All Henri had left to remember of those times were the faint scars that crawled up her body, wounds dealt by an invisible hand. Lysithea told her of the price she had paid, how much work it took to finally remove her own scars from her body. When she watched Lysithea’s face as she recalled those times, the same expression reflected on Hubert’s face now, Henri couldn’t decide which option was worse: being pure or aware. 

His sharp tone brought her back to the parlor. “To me, you are a memory, a thought, and a dream, as it were.”

She paused, noting the contradictions. “I’m afraid I do not follow your logic.”

“I never expected you too,” he answered, resting his elbows on the desk and linking his fingers under his chin. He flashed that familiar, satisfied grin that had so often driven others, _especially_ Ferdinand, to anger. But to Henri, it had always served a different purpose; it was an affirmation that there was more left to know, more left to be said.

She kept her eyes trained on him, waiting for his response.

He sighed. “You embody… the past we fought against, the present we fought for… and the dream of a future we’d always hoped to have. Resigning you to another prison would have made all of that... meaningless, I suppose.”

She considered his response for a moment, but recognized that a moment wouldn’t be a sufficient enough time for her to process it. She’d think of it again and again, for the rest of her life, for as many times as it took to commit the words to memory. She nodded.

“But enough talk of that.” He said, pointing one shaky finger at the journal in her hands. There was a slight catch in his voice. “What is it that you’ve brought me?”

Henri walked from the door and stopped before Hubert’s desk. She slowly placed the thick tome down, pushing it closer to him. His eyes widened slightly as he recognized the swirly, frivolous lines of Ferdinand’s signature on the front cover.

“This is…?” He began, his words cutting off into a sharp whistle.

“Former Prime Minister Ferdinand von Aegir requests to speak with you.” She answered.

He tore his eyes away from the journal and glanced up at her, an eyebrow quirked up suspiciously.

She returned a steadfast gaze, and then nodded.

He sighed. Removing his glasses from his face, he began rubbing small circles into his temples. “What an insufferable man...”

“I was ordered to deliver it on this date.” Giving a soft bow, she continued, “It arrived at my home one month ago.”

Hubert lifted his head to the ceiling. “Then… right before he…” He cut himself off with another sigh. “And of its contents?”

“They are unknown to me,” she answered, her first and her only, she promised, lie to her rescuer.

“Of course only Ferdinand would leave me with a tome of this size to parse through. I doubt I even have the years left to arrive at the midway point.”

A sudden pang resonated throughout her chest. “If you have survived Ferdinand’s rants for these many years, then I am sure that you will survive this too, Hubert.” 

A glint of amusement flashed in his eyes before a chuckle slipped past his lips. It was a quirky, choked sound, more distorted since she’d last heard it years ago. And the coughing fit that followed it was certainly new to her.

Henri reached into her pocket and quickly offered a handkerchief. Hubert accepted it graciously. 

“Thank you, Henrietta,” he replied as the fit subsided. The flash of red on the handkerchief was quickly masked by carefully positioned gloved fingers. But age had slowed him.

She held out her hand. “I will take that back now.”

“I’ll clean it and return it to you.” He answered, putting the handkerchief in his pocket.

Defiance then. There was only one person he’d listen to, she knew.

Henri kept her hand leveled at him. 

He stared back at her.

She nodded.

“‘ _Fear not, for you are not alone. I am here with you, and you will no longer be surrendered to this dark suffering._ ’”

She recognized that the words sounded clunky and off-kilter coming from her mouth, bereft of the passion and confidence possessed by Ferdinand that had brought them to life half a century ago. She hoped that he wouldn’t take it as a mocking imitation of the man he loved, one of the men she had revered most in this world.

Hubert dug the handkerchief out of his pocket, suddenly using it to pat away at his eyes. He then returned it to her outstretched palm, but his hand lingered slightly in hers, neither of them pushing it past a soft graze. But it was enough, a shared sigh. He nodded at her.

“Those words are in the journal,” she said.

Hubert looked up at her. “I had a feeling you were lying to me about not having read it.”

She broke the connection of their hands and slipped the handkerchief back into her pocket. She then flipped over the journal on the desk. “Well, I suppose ‘in’ is not the correct word.”

And sure enough, there on the back cover of the tome, was the quote, written in that flamboyantly excessive style of his.

The sliver of a smile relaxed the harsh edges of Hubert’s face. “That damnable fool _was_ always so proud of those words...”

“You smiled like this on that day, too.” She said, now choosing to perform a pale imitation of Hubert from that day so long ago.

“Maybe so,” he replied, eyes once again chasing the shadows behind her shoulder. 

Hubert leaned back in his chair, bringing the journal to his lap. He slowly curled one leg over the other, the movement dramatized with an audible crack as his hips settled into place. He leaned the massive tome against his raised knee as he reached towards the table and picked up his glasses, bringing them to rest against the harsh curve of his nose. 

There was a slight hesitation before he opened the journal to the first page. Henri watched his eyes closely as they began to scan over the words written there. His eyes flitted over the page for at most a couple seconds before they rolled upwards.

“He really began this manifesto to me with an introduction of himself,” he laughed. He turned his attention back to Henri. “I assume you can guess his very first line?”

“I have an idea of what it could be.” She said as she slowly settled into the plush leather armchair opposite his desk. 

She watched him as he began to read through the journal, occasionally offering up his own critiques and complaints. At one point something written there brought the faintest tinge of pink to his cheeks. He looked up, almost embarrassed, and seemed to realize that Henri was still there, sitting opposite him. 

Hubert cleared his throat. “Of course he would say such things as this, when I’m unable to respond to him,” he muttered before engrossing himself in the journal once more.

Eventually, long after the faint blush faded from his face, he began reading the journal aloud. Henri sat and listened to every word, stories and reminisces of their shared life that Ferdinand had been recording ever since the end of the war. 

But soon, her own name began to join the words that Ferdinand had written. She remembered every little detail of the encounters and moments he brought up. The memories were clear and intact, perfect reflections of those moments she had lived so long ago.

As Hubert continued to read, she recalled the times she had walked into their study, her silent steps unnoticed by the couple who were so consumed in those moments by their love for one another. The times she’d caught them sharing a kiss or dancing to melodies only they could hear. The way they laughed at her first exclamation of shock when she realized just how high up one was when sitting on the back of a horse. The mixed concern and contentment on Hubert’s face when her propensity for dark magic was revealed. The shiny glint to Ferdinand’s eyes when they’d brought Phillip home for the first time. The soft worries that plagued their features everytime she or Philip had fallen ill. The way Ferdinand’s face lit up when Philip introduced them all to his fiancee, and the way he cried when he’d finally become a grandfather. The way Hubert hid his face from her as she convinced him not to assign a soldier to her small home by the deserted fortress when she’d left her family, determined to find herself. Not knowing that it wouldn’t be until this moment, as she listened to Hubert read Ferdinand’s diary and felt that wave of familiarity as if all three of them were here, talking in Hubert’s study, like that moment five years ago, like those hundreds of moments fifty years ago… that she would find herself _here,_ at home. 

“Henrietta,” she heard Hubert call tentatively, his voice bringing her back. She looked up at him, finally noticing the tears as they rolled down the curves of her cheeks.

“He told me about the journal at the reunion, father,” she began, a foreign voice strangled by sobs emerging from her mouth. “Before I left, he said he’d been writing it for years. He told me he’d send it to me before he passed, that it would have instructions for when I should personally deliver it to you... I would’ve braved a crowd of _thousands_ for him, you know that father, but I couldn’t… I didn’t want to come back knowing that he wouldn’t be…”

Her sobs consumed her completely as Hubert abruptly stood up and walked around the desk to where she was seated, one hand pressed against the desk to steady himself. She watched him slowly raise his other hand, gloved palm facing upward, offering it to her. 

He didn’t need to say the words.

She took his hand and was pulled into their first shared embrace, silent and mournful, her choked sobs mirrored by his own.

**...**

She stayed with her father for some time after that, the two of them setting aside time each day to parse through the journal, sharing the duty of reading it aloud. As the weeks edged on, it became more difficult for Hubert to sit up on his own, so they’d taken to reading in his bedroom instead. He lay on the bed, propped up by the gaudy collection of pillows that Ferdinand had amassed over the years, as she sat on the divan that one of the servants had moved into the room. Eventually she took on the role of reading entirely, his coughing fits preventing him from comfortably reciting more than a few sentences at a time.

The night they began the last fourth of the journal, she asked him if he wanted her to call for Phillip. Hubert didn’t want her to write to him too early though, but just made her promise that she’d be here, waiting for Philip when he returned to the estate.

A few nights later, they gradually made their way through the final pages of the journal. It was slow work, with Henrietta stopping every few paragraphs to make sure he was still there, still listening. He’d quip back that he already knew the ending, having lived through it and all. But with each lazy retort he still wore that same, sardonic smirk on his face. She’d smile too, returning to the journal, only to interrupt herself minutes later and repeat the same cycle again.

Eventually, as the flames in the fireplace died down, they reached the end of the journal. She closed the book with finality, preparing to place it down and address the sudden wetness on her face, when this time it was her father who interrupted her.

“Don’t assume you’re done yet,” he said, a shaky finger raised slightly and pointed at the book, “there’s still the back cover.”

She nodded. She said the words.

He smiled.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for taking the time to read this! This is the first fic I've written in over a decade haha so I'd love to hear your thoughts! Originally I based the outline off of "The Remains of the Day" by Kazuo Ishiguro. In it, Henri was an old butler who had served Hubert and Ferdinand for most of her life following the war. As I was writing it though, it just felt better for me to make her their daughter instead, albeit with a somewhat unusual relationship with them.
> 
> There's a reference to lyrics from the song "Tripping in Triplets," by The Dear Hunter in this fic; the song has a melancholy vibe that fits the mood of the fic if you're interested in listening.
> 
> My next Ferdibert fic (which is about 70% written) will be about that conspicuous amulet on Hubert's desk; it's going to be extremely stupid.
> 
> I'm Catatune over on Twitter btw; feel free to hit me up over there.


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